“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Kelly applied a new gauze patch. I got up from the table, and she stood behind me and wrapped her arms around my waist. Her hands were warm from the hot water.
“It feels like you’re being deployed,” she said, pressing her face into the center of my back.
“Maya deserves another chance,” I said. I felt her breath on my skin.
“Even if she doesn’t want one?”
I turned to face her. She knew my answer.
She lifted her face. A tear formed in the corner of her eye. I kissed her and held her tight against me.
“I can’t do this,” she said. “You never stop. One day you’ll…. I can’t even say it. It’s bad luck.”
“I know.”
My phone rang.
“You don’t have to answer it,” she said.
I looked at the caller ID. Skeeter.
“’Bout time,” I said, pushing connect.
Kelly turned away.
“You always underestimate the difficulty of what I do,” he said.
“Come on, you’re sittin’ on your ass hacking computers. How hard could it be?”
“If it was that easy, you’d be doin’ it for yourself.”
“Fair enough. You wanna raise?”
“That would be nice.”
“I made you a full partner. What more do you want?”
“How ’bout an actual paycheck?”
“The meat’s on the way. What have you got?”
“The Dragon’s an entrepreneur.”
“That means he’s got a soft spot.”
“Is Kelly there, or did you run her off?”
I put the phone on speaker. “She’s right here.”
“Hi, Clarence,” she said without enthusiasm.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I’m going back to Lubbock. You boys are on your own.”
“What did he say to you?”
She laughed, but only out of habit. “I’m going back to work before I lose my day job.”
“Good for you,” Skeeter said. He understood as well as I did why she had to go.
“You take care,” she said.
I took the phone off speaker and listened to Skeeter’s report. He had what I needed. He was good at his job. It was time for plan B.
Kelly gathered her clothes from upstairs and packed her duffle bag. When she came back downstairs, I followed her out to her pickup.
“I’m going after—” I started to tell her my plan, but she cut me off.
“I don’t want to know the details.”
She climbed in her pickup, and I shut her door.
She started the engine and rolled down the window. “When it’s over, give me call. I’d like to know you’re safe. I don’t wanna read about you online.” She started to close the window but stopped. “This isn’t all about your job, you know. One day you’re gonna have to deal with your mother. She really did a number on you.”
I felt my cheeks and neck turning red.
“Don’t get all bent out of shape. It’s just my observation. You should talk to her.”
I nodded. I didn’t have anything to say.
She finished rolling the window up and drove to the front gate.
There was no moon. The Milky Way provided a blanket of cold stars. The north wind had died, but the air was still and cold and crisp. I pulled the collar of my jean jacket tight around my neck. Maybe she was right, but right now I needed to clear my head of distractions and focus on finding Maya.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Lucky’s gym was located on the west side of San Antonio in a working-class neighborhood—a mixture of neglected track houses, auto shops, and taco stands. I stopped at the stand I’d visited with Kelly and found grandma still hard at work, standing on her wooden box behind a sizzling grill. She recognized me and flashed a toothless smile.
“Buenos días,” she called to me.
“Tengo hambre,” I said.
She laughed and rubbed her own stomach. I didn’t understand what she said after that, but I guessed it was something like, you’ve come to the right place.
“Donde está su hijo?” I asked, not seeing the younger man that was there the night before.
“La universidad,” she said. She was obviously very proud. She was putting her son through college by dishing out tacos to hungry gringos.
“Muy bien,” I said. “Dos huevos y barbacoa.”
She plopped a scoop of lard on the hot griddle and went to work cracking eggs in a plastic bowl with her right hand while she sliced the barbacoa with her left, movements she could do in her sleep. I gave her a five-dollar tip when she bagged my breakfast. Her eyes lit up. I was becoming a regular customer.
Lucky’s gym was the anchor business for a strip mall that also housed a Mexican restaurant, a tattoo and massage parlor, and a mom-and-pop gas station. It was a big two-story building that had once been a furniture store. Caesar Hernandez, or “Lucky,” had retired from an impressive welterweight professional career and used his winnings to open a boxing gym as a way to give back to the community.
I parked on the street and tossed my taco wrapper and paper bag in the trash on my way through the front door. In the afternoon, after the local school let out, the ground floor looked like a high school gym. Lucky let the kids work out for free as long as they showed him a report card each session to prove they were in school and keeping up their grades. The mornings were reserved for serious training and guys like me who were trying to stay in shape.
Lucky’s partner, Jerry Muth, aka Sarge, had taken over the upstairs. Sarge was an ex-Army Ranger who offered classes in mixed martial arts. He was cashing in on wannabe tough guys who were watching MMA on TV thinking they should get in on the action. Sarge was the quiet type who looked like Chuck Norris with a gray ponytail and could kick your ass before you knew he was pissed.
I found Lucky leaning on the center ring ropes watching two middleweights pound away on each other. Before I took a bullet in my arm and shoulder, I came in three times a week and sometimes sparred with his heavyweights. I wasn’t a natural boxer, but Lucky liked the fact that I could take a punch. I considered that a compliment.
When the bell rang to signal the end of the round, Lucky jumped down and shook my hand. “What you doin’ here? Figured you was still recuperatin’?” He grinned, exposing his missing front teeth. He had two gold replacements, but he kept them in his pocket when he was at the gym.
“I still have to put food on the table. You know how it is when you work for yourself.”
“I got a sparring partner waitin’ for you when you’re ready.”
I missed my normal routine. Before my last case tossed my life into a tailspin, I did my roadwork at night along the River Walk trail. Whatever time I got home, from ten p.m. to three a.m., my Lab, Sam would be ready at the back door, wagging his tail and barking. Three times a week, I was at Lucky’s working his collection of free weights for strength, the speedbag, focus mitts, and finishing in the ring with a sparring partner. It was usually an up-and-comer Lucky was tuning up for a fight or a young kid auditioning for club membership.
I did three sets of squats with three quarters of my max weight. I needed to ease back into the routine after taking a couple of months off. By the last rep, my leg muscles were complaining loudly. I switched from weights to lunges and let the muscles scream a little louder. I was one of those guys who enjoyed the workout pain. It gave me a little more confidence that the muscles would be there when I needed them. The lower-body work wasn’t what I was concerned about. The real question was the bullet wound in my chest. Kelly had proved it wasn’t ready.
After six rounds with the speedbag, I was feeling more confident. I checked under my shirt. The bandage was still in place and didn’t show any sign of leaking. I switched to the heavy bag. I imagined the bag was the Dragon. The more I thought about him, the harder my p
unches got. I slammed my fist into the canvas with everything I had. My head moved with my shoulders and torso. My feet followed the rhythm, but my movements were rusty. I pushed myself harder.
Russell Stevens’s smiling mugshot danced with the bag. I wondered if prison had changed him or simply revealed his true nature. What did he say to Maya to make her want to stay with him? When I found her again and told her what her granddad had said, would she still choose Russell? I believed she wanted to be free. I believed she wanted a second chance. That’s what kept me going. I didn’t want this to end like Cynthia Ann Parker, after a twenty-one-year chase.
Lucky tapped me on the shoulder, and the image disappeared.
“You trainin’ for a fight?” he asked.
It took a moment to clear the image of Russell Stevens and Maya escaping on horseback from my mind. Lucky had been watching me the whole time. He knew fighters and fighting better than most. He knew me and my fighting style. He could tell when I was playing around and when I was focused on a specific opponent.
“You need some time in the ring. Let’s see if you’re ready.” He gestured toward the center ring, where a big black guy in his early twenties was shadowboxing in the corner.
He was right. Working a bag was great for stress relief and to build confidence, but nothing took the place of stepping into the ring with an opponent who could punch back.
I slipped on the headgear and switched to a pair of sixteen-ounce sparring gloves. The black kid was heavy, almost the same size and weight as the Dragon, and quick on his feet. He danced back and forth while I climbed into the ring. His hands were quick. He showed off a lethal jab/hook combination that had probably taken out more than a few opponents.
We met Lucky in the center of the ring and touched gloves.
“Nick Fischer meet Darnell Green. He’s trying out for a spot on my team.”
I nodded.
Lucky turned to Darnell. “Mr. Fischer’s got a fight coming up. He needs a little tune-up.”
Darnell showed his white teeth through his mouth guard. I knew he thought Lucky was joking. Lucky never joked. Not about fighting or boxing.
The bell rang, and Darnell came on fast. I blocked his first combination and landed a right hand to his left ear guard. It didn’t faze him. He could take a punch. We traded several more punches. I didn’t have what Lucky would call “style.” I usually planted my feet, blocked incoming punches, and waited for my opponent to drop his guard.
Darnell had style and footwork. He had more to prove and was definitely trying to show off for Lucky. He landed a good left to my chin that set me back on my heels. I countered with an overhand right that jolted his confidence. Until that punch, he had been thinking of me as an old man getting in a workout—he wanted to show off, but he didn’t want to knock me out. After that punch, all bets were off.
By the end of the round, my legs were shaking, and my lungs were on fire—the result of a month of inactivity. I leaned against the ropes and noticed Darnell staring at my chest from across the ring. I looked down and saw blood. Lucky was beside me before I could grab a towel from the corner and cover it up. The bell rang, but Lucky waved Darnell off.
“Enough for today,” he said.
Darnell walked over to my corner. “You okay, man?” He looked concerned, like he’d hit me a little too hard. His heart was in the right place.
“I’m good,” I told him. “It’s from an older wound.”
Lucky stripped off my gloves, and I pulled my T-shirt over my head. The bandage had come off, and blood was leaking from the broken scab. Darnell shook his head and climbed out of the ring.
Jerry Muth had come down from the second floor to watch the sparring match. He handed me a clean towel, and I pressed it over the wound.
“You should probably take another month off,” he said.
Lucky helped me take off my headgear, studying me like a trainer. “Whatever you got planned, you ain’t ready,” he said.
“You know how it goes. Trouble don’t wait for you to get ready,” I said, climbing out of the ring. I checked the clock on the wall. It was almost time for Skeeter to show up. I started for the locker room, but Lucky and Sarge blocked my path.
“What trouble?” Lucky asked.
Both of them had helped me out of a jam on my last case. Four thugs had shown up at the gym with the intent of doing me harm. They were young and cocky and working for the lawyer who was trying to keep me from interfering in his political ambitions. Lucky and Sarge had stood at the top of the stairs, accepted the thugs’ insults and amused banter about their advanced age, and then calmly kicked their asses.
I was reluctant to get them involved with Russell Stevens. They had proved that they were both tough fighters, even though they were both pushing seventy, but things were going to get western, and I didn’t want to be responsible for them getting hurt or worse. I wasn’t going to play games or give any warnings. This was a strictly S&D mission—search and destroy.
“Let’s have it, jarhead,” Sarge said. He was a retired Army master sergeant and had earned the right to call me jarhead.
“All right. Let me get cleaned up,” I said.
Lucky was waiting for me with rubbing alcohol, a fresh gauze pad, and surgical tape when I came out of the shower. He was a good corner man.
While Lucky worked on my shoulder wound, I told them Maya’s story starting with the party on the Pedernales River. By the time I got to the part about finding her in the flophouse and her running away, Skeeter had joined us. He took the story from there while I finished getting dressed. He explained the Dragon’s connection to the strip club and added his new findings. Russell was running drugs out of two used tire stores on the south side. I didn’t ask him how he found out. I didn’t want to know.
“I can’t ask y’all to get involved,” I said.
“You don’t have to ask,” Sarge said. “That young girl’s in danger.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It was Tuesday afternoon. The sky was clear. The temperature was a crisp, dry sixty-four degrees, and the shit was about to hit the fan. My plan B was simple—rattle the Dragon’s chain until he made a mistake, then nail him and take Maya back where she belongs.
The first stop was the strip club. The parking lot was mostly empty. There were two pickups out front and a City of San Antonio work truck parked near the back door, out of sight of the street. A black jacked-up Dodge Ram pickup occupied the reserved space near the back door.
I checked the magazine in my Springfield .45 and strapped the S&W .38 on my ankle. Skeeter loaded the pistol-grip 870 shotgun. Lucky and Sarge watched from the back seat.
“You can wait in the pickup,” I said to Skeeter. Of the four of us, he was the least prepared for this kind of operation. Skeeter was a gridiron tough guy. Grew up playing football. He’d weighed in at over two hundred and fifty pounds since ninth grade and didn’t get into many street fights. His training consisted of a YouTube video on how to operate a model 870. That and watching me.
“I’m in,” Skeeter said. “You made me a full partner, remember? Let’s find Maya.”
Sarge tucked a Glock 9mm in his waistband and followed us to the back door. I knew I didn’t have to worry about Lucky or Sarge. Lucky grew up on the mean streets across the border in Nuevo Laredo. He knew the kind of people we were dealing with. Sarge was like me, a combat veteran, trained to neutralize the enemy. We weren’t here to negotiate a surrender or read anybody their rights.
The back door was open. It was a VIP entrance used by local celebrities and members of the resident pro basketball team. We slipped into the darkness. There were crates of booze and cases of beer stacked to the ceiling. An AC/DC song drifted in from the main floor. I held up my hand. We all stopped and waited for our eyes to adjust to the darkness.
“Follow my lead,” I said, pulling my Springfield and stepping through the curtain. Only the main stage was occupied. A young dancer worked the ch
rome dance pole in a drug-fueled haze to “You Shook Me All Night Long.”
The beefy bouncer with the shaved head slouched against the back wall watching the performance. He turned just in time to see the barrel of my Springfield approaching his left ear. He crumpled into a pile on the floor. The dancer kept humping chrome, oblivious. Her focus was on the greenbacks in the city worker’s hand.
There was movement near the front entrance. I pointed in that direction, and Sarge and Lucky took off. Skeeter followed me between the tables toward the bar. The bouncer with the neck tattoo glanced up from behind the bar. He dropped the beer he was holding and reached under the counter. I aimed my .45 at this head.
“Hands on the bar,” I yelled over AC/DC.
Neck Tatt slowly put his hands on the bar. Skeeter sank onto a stool and pointed the 870 at the guy’s chest.
“Be cool. Stay put and you won’t get hurt,” I told him.
His eyes were on the barrel of the shotgun. A twelve gauge always looks bigger when it’s pointing at you at short range.
“You fucked up, man,” he said. He wasn’t scared, but he respected Skeeter’s weapon.
“You’re gonna tell me where the Dragon is.”
“He’ll kill you.”
“Where is he? Let’s get the party started. I know he’s pimping girls. I know he’s dealing drugs in here. He can’t do that without your permission. You must have a really cozy relationship. How does it work? You need new meat on stage, you give him a call, and he shows up with the girls and passes out the drug candy? Is that it?”
Neck Tatt’s eyes darted to the office door, like he expected someone to come out. The brass knob turned, and the door moved. I took a step and kicked the door just as Arnold Garza shoved his pistol through the opening. The gun exploded, sending a stab of flame into the dark room, followed by the young dancer’s scream. The city worker scrambled for the door, taking his fist full of dollars with him.
I brought the Springfield down hard on Arnold’s wrist. His pistol dropped to the floor. I grabbed his hand and yanked him out the door. He went to his knees still wearing the blue velvet suit he’d had on when we first met. His hipster glasses flew to the carpet. I kicked him onto his back and aimed my pistol at his mouth.
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